On to chapter two!

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It's Always You

Chapter Two

November 18, 2015

The first time Nick ever sees Jess, he's at home.

They're sitting in his living room with Schmidt and Coach. She's perched on the chair in front of them and her hands are tucked beneath her thighs. She's pretty, even with the giant glasses and goofy grin. He can't help but furrow his brow when she sings, though. And weirdly it's already happened four times in the twenty minutes she's been sitting there.

She's just launched into her story about why she's looking for a place to live (which is odd considering the question was whether she had pets ("Well, no, but I do have plants. Uh, had plants. You see, they're still at my old place with my...my ex…")) when the realization dawns on Nick: Jess is an actual cartoon character come to life. Everything she says is exaggerated, over-the-top, and borderline crazy. If her words were coming out of literally any other human being on earth, Nick is sure they would have slammed the door in her face long before this point. But when she turns her head up toward the ceiling, offering Nick, Schmidt, and Coach a moment to exchange glances, Nick knows one thing for sure – coming from Jess, it all seems perfectly natural. Over-the-top, sure, but in a really refreshing, innocent, genuine kind of way. And the look Coach gives him tells him that they're thinking the same thing. Schmidt, however…

It isn't until Jess mentions Cece that Schmidt is finally in agreement.

He well and truly hates himself when he backslides with Caroline.

Not that he would ever, ever admit it to any of his incredibly annoying roommates. What do they want from him? A few months ago he thought he was dying of cancer. Who did he have to turn to? Who would he have left behind? His three adult roommates and a crappy mixtape full of really awesome songs and his subpar teenage DJing skills? He hates himself for doing it, but he knows eventually he'll learn to live with it.

Dying alone is not in his plans. And it doesn't really look like things are headed anywhere with Jess like he initially thought they might, so he'll fall back on the one person he knows and who knows him. Caroline is safe. Caroline is secure. Caroline was crazy, but he genuinely believes she's different now.

It takes Jess's heartfelt confession, coyote-induced terror, and a really really bad impression of the Roadrunner for Nick to realize that he isn't worried about Jess needing him. She's made it through her entire life thus far without him. It's him who needs her. His life just hasn't been the same since she waltzed through the front door. Sure, she drives him crazy sometimes with her innate singing and her inability to say 'penis,' but for the love of God he's never sang a song from a cheesy eighties movie at the top of his lungs in the middle of a fancy restaurant or threatened to hit a guy while wearing a woman's hat or yelled at a bunch of rich people to turn on their Christmas lights at two o'clock in the morning, and in the last few months he's done all of those things and more for Jess. He hasn't felt as useless since she's been around, plain and simple.

She makes him believe that things (and maybe even people) can be good. That life can be good. Weird, definitely, but also really good. He's sure he never felt that way when he was with Caroline. Caroline was a relationship. Jess is...something different entirely.

And it's his anticipation over seeing the look on her face that makes him walk out of his and Caroline's would-be apartment without saying a word to sneak back into his apartment late at night and blast that crappy DJ mixtape loud enough that his empty bedroom doesn't feel empty anymore and Winston tries to break through the wall between their rooms. And when Jess calls him a clown, he smiles, because he's starting to think that maybe he's rubbing off on her, too.

The first time Nick ever kisses Jess, it's just before three o'clock in the morning.

Jess has been living there for over a year which is crazy and he's just lost his trench coat and he's pretty bummed about that, but the feeling of Jess's lips moving with his and her hands scrabbling up his chest to find purchase behind his neck sort of wipes all of that out. His heart is hammering and it's a little awkward at first but they melt into it like it's something they've been doing all their lives. Kissing her makes him feel strong, like he can do anything, like for the first time ever he's in charge of his own destiny. But then he hears the springs of Jess's mattress groan from behind her closed bedroom door and in an instant his whole mind comes crashing back to reality – Sam's in there. Sam, Jess's boyfriend, is just a few feet away behind a closed but very thin bedroom door.

Normally that kind of realization would cause him to shove her away forcefully so that he would have enough room to stiffly panic-moonwalk into the safe confines of his darkened room, but that foreign feeling of strength soothes that desire long enough for him to gently break the kiss. He keeps his forehead flush against hers and kisses her again, and again, each shorter than the last. He pulls away and waits for her to look up at him, her blue eyes wide and full of wonder. His arms are still around her when he murmurs, "I meant somethin' like that."

The strength lasts just long enough for him to walk away, to leave her standing in the middle of the hallway while closes his bedroom door behind him. He hears her bedroom door open moments later and Sam's sleepy voice is mumbling something he can't understand. Jess responds quietly, something heavy hits the ground, and her door closes.

Oh my God. OH MY GOD.

The first time he ever sleeps with Jess, he wakes up naked in his bed.

She's just inches away from him, her back turned to him, and for a moment all he can really do is stare at the way the morning sun streaming through his window makes her porcelain skin glow. She's perfect. So unbelievably perfect. She even smells perfect. He rolls to his side and props himself up so that he can get a better look at her. Her eyes are closed and her eyelashes are so long they brush against her cheeks. Light, nearly invisible freckles dust her nose and cheekbones and his heart throbs almost painfully at the sight of them. She's so sexy and adorable and hot and unequivocally beautiful it makes him ache. He almost doesn't believe that she's actually lying there with him, especially after all the awkward romantic tension they've been wading through recently. He's dreamed of this moment for so long now that it wouldn't surprise him if he suddenly woke up alone at any time. But he reaches out and runs his middle finger along her shoulder blade and he knows that his brain, as Hemingway-esque as it is, could never produce a dream vivid enough to really capture the smoothness of her skin. He's happy, so happy he just might burst. A hole in his heart he never knew he had is suddenly full of all things Jess. This must be what contentment feels like.

Sleeping her was like going home. Except without all the annoying cousins and little brothers and smothering mother. It was all the warmth and love and safety he's ever felt as an adult in his childhood home, like for a moment he could forget his terrible credit score and box full of unpaid late bills and he could just be Nick. And yet somehow, at the same time, he felt like some kind of fairy tale knight come to rescue his princess, like somehow his destiny has been to have her all along. Sleeping with her made him want to whisk her away and lock her up on a tower to keep anything and anyone from hurting her ever again. Sleeping with her, weirdly, made him realize just how much he's willing to die for her. He'd never be able to let her go after that.

He's having a brief moment of paranoid panic (Oh my God did I KILL HER?) when his movements rouse her from her sleep. She sleepily asks him if he's checking her pulse and he laughs because wow this is real and then she laughs too and he's giddy. He's never been this excited, not even when he was a kid on Christmas morning. He wants to do something for her, something that will show her just how much he appreciates her, so he urges her to stay in his bed while he scrambles to his feet. He almost forgets to put on his clothes before he bounds out of his bedroom and he can feel Jess's eyes linger on him while he haphazardly dresses. For some reason, it doesn't bother him. That feeling of strength is back but it's multiplied by a billion and he's pretty sure he could take over China if he tried right that moment. But he doesn't want to take over China. He just wants to make her breakfast.

When he decides to pursue a relationship with Jess, they're in an unfamiliar parking lot.

His suit jacket is slung over his shoulder and his breath smells like the beer he's been nursing but Winston's words are still ringing in his ears. The shock of seeing Jess still there milling around by her car and twisting the hem of her sari uncertainly between her fingers makes his heart swell with the hope that maybe she feels just as strongly for him as he does for her. She's crying and pleading with him to give it a chance, to give her a chance, to give them a chance, and it's all he can do to control himself when he quickly closes the distance between them and kisses her. Because if he really could have his way, he would have her pinned to the side of that car so that he can do things beneath her sari too obscene to happen just outside of a temple. Instead he settles on kissing her soundly so that there is no room for doubt in her mind that he's in, like all in, and he knows when she smiles against him that she knows.

He asks for her keys once he's convinced her doubts are quelled and they squabble over which direction to turn, and within a week he's haggard and filthy in a weird Mexican hotel prison, fishing the shredded remains of his passport out of a trash bin with Schmidt while Jess quietly holds Winston's shirt and pants, watching Winston puzzle the little book back together again over his shoulder. Jess keeps making eye-contact with him and smiling this secret smile and a strange, almost foreign feeling of peace settles over him. His family. His family. Dysfunctional and annoying as hell, but still his.

The first time he ever tells Jess he loves her, they're on the sidewalk outside of their apartment building.

His heart stops in his chest as his words suddenly register inside his apparently pea-sized brain. So far he's said the phrase three times in his life to people he is not directly related to and he immediately regretted all three of them. All three. Without exception. It's unbelievable, really, considering he vowed months ago at the start of this relationship to keep his declarations of love to himself for once. But it's out there now and he can't take it back.

Her eyes go wide and her brows knit together, but otherwise her thrilled expression remains motionless. He can see Cece glancing quickly between them, her eyes wide too, and when Jess's hands raise slowly over the limo window in the shape of finger-guns (really, Jess? Finger-guns?) Cece's mouth drops open and she shakes her head in disbelief.

The limo pulls away and Jess is still frozen in place, her hands hanging out the window. Nick remains motionless too. Awkwardness hangs thickly in the air around him, and he doesn't look around when the guys pat his shoulders consolingly.

He's still standing on the sidewalk, hands buried deep in his pockets, when the guys come back out and offer to take him to the bar. He agrees to go immediately. Alcohol is exactly what he needs.

He doesn't get it. Everything with Jess seemed to be going so well up until that point. He does love her, he's loved her for a long time, so it isn't like he said it in the heat of a fight or anything. It came from a place of honesty. This is the first time he ever feels uncertain in his relationship with Jess. He can imagine her laughing and twirling around on the dance floor, Prince himself sweeping her off her feet and taking her away from pudgy, homely Nick. Maybe it's the alcohol buzzing in his brain combined with that uncertainty that makes him think that Schmidt's idea of crashing Prince's party is a good one, but he decides to go with it. Things couldn't get any worse, could they?

A whirlwind of sexual Prius conversations, Fire and Ice, Trojan horsing in some models, scooping an unconscious Jess up off the dance floor, realizing that his fears of Prince sweeping Jess off her feet might actually become reality, drunkenly ruining Fire and Ice, and awkwardly clearing out a wide berth on the dance floor later, Jess is screaming that she loves him at the top of her lungs. He lunges toward her and yanks her close, and the moment his lips hit hers every other person on the dance floor ceases to exist. The uncertainty from earlier is gone; it's just the pounding bass line of Prince's music in his ears and the feeling of Jess beneath his lips and against his chest. Nick screws his eyes shut and pulls her closer, desperate to commit the moment to memory, to lose himself in it, to become it. But thankfully the moment ends, because less than two minutes later he's on stage three feet away from Prince who's singing a song he's pretty sure no one has ever heard before with Jess (is that what they've been doing this whole time? Learning a song?), dancing with Schmidt and Cece and Winston and Coach and he's never felt more alive than he does in that moment. Forget China, Nick could take over the entire world right then. He knows he can, so long as Jess (and maybe Prince, too) is there to sing his battle song.

She's standing two feet away from him in their bedroom when they break up.

It isn't as if she's miles away, but the space between them may as well be the distance between galaxies. Her eyes are wide and shining with tears and everything inside of him wants to die. It isn't like the devastation Caroline left behind; this is something so much more real, so much more raw. Because if there's one thing he knows in this world, it's that he loves Jess more fiercely and more purely than any other human being on the planet.

But what she said makes sense. He knows it deep down; somewhere along the line, they stopped being friends. He hates it viciously, wants to physically attack it. He wants her back so desperately.

The odd thing is that he can pinpoint the exact moment they turned down this dead-end street.

Abby Day.

Abby's whirlwind arrival and departure left behind a trail of destruction. She'd broken everything. She broke Schmidt. She broke Nick and Jess. And now she's gone, far away in Portland, probably sleeping like a baby just a few doors down from Joan. None the wiser to the catastrophe unfolding back in LA in her wake.

Nick feels weak. He's tired. He wants to fight, he wants to scream for her, but he can't. He can't even bring himself to sing-shout over her words. He just doesn't have it in him anymore. The fog he's spent so much of his life lost in is back, thicker than ever, and that voice inside his head is wondering why he ever thought any of it was gone for good. And the worst part of it is that they can't even get some space. Schmidt is camped out in Jess's old room, so they sleep separately on either side of the charred remains of their bed. Nick glares up at the ceiling and tries to make the voice in his head shut up. He writes it on his hand, hoping the pain of the pen digging into his skin would make the aching in his heart dull for a moment. It doesn't.

Sometime in the night, the dull, repetitive, wondering thoughts about where things went wrong finally torture him into unconsciousness.